Candidate Profile: Sara Brescia For Manassas City School Board

MANASSAS, VA — Sara Brescia is one of several candidates hoping to fill three open at-large seats on the Manassas City School Board on Nov. 8.

Other candidates in the race for the city's school board include Lisa Stevens, Mel Kent, Abraham "Alex" Iqbal, Jill Spall, and Samuel Gross.

Read more: General Election 2022: Dates, Races To Know In Manassas

Patch asked each of the candidates in the school board race to fill out the following questionnaire.

Name

Sara Brescia

Party affiliation

Independent - Endorsed by Manassas Republican Party.

Family?

Husband Eric and mother of two young daughters.

Does anyone in your family work in politics or government?

No.

Education level?

B.A. History, Barnard College, Columbia University

Occupation, including employer and years of experience.

Currently I am the Vice-President of Alpha-Bet Preschool here in Manassas. I’ve been with Alpha-Bet for two years. I also have previous experience working in public education prior to becoming a paralegal.

Previous or Current Elected or Appointed Office?

None.

Campaign website.

bresciaforschoolboard.com

Why are you seeking elective office?

I am running for School Board because our schools fall short of their potential. It is time we re-evaluate how we run our schools to make them more effective and attractive to our whole community. We spend about 18 percent more per student than Prince William County and Manassas Park public schools, yet this is not translating into superior results. Graduation rates, test scores, advanced diplomas, and absenteeism have for years been generally worse that our neighbors.

Six out of the seven current School Board members either ran unopposed in their last election or were appointed to fill a vacancy, and I believe the School Board as an institution has become too comfortable with the status quo. I have young kids, and I am invested in creating a public school system that effectively serves the entire community.

The single most pressing issue facing our (board, district, etc.) is _______, and this is what I intend to do about it.

We have two related problems. The first is that we are leaving too many kids behind: our schools’ test scores, graduation rates, and other metrics are lower than they should be. This in turn creates our second problem: a negative reputation that keeps families from choosing MCPS.

Too many children in the public schools are not receiving the educations they should be, while families with means often feel compelled to seek a more rigorous education by moving or seeking alternative schooling options. This limits our kids’ futures, burdens our families, and fragments our community.

I want to focus on raising academic expectations and addressing behavioral and attendance problems; broadening our schools’ appeal to our entire community including through better outreach; and providing serious oversight to constructively challenge the status quo.

The pandemic was a difficult time requiring many tough decisions. However, I think the School Board was slow to adapt to changing information and kept children from in-person class for too long, at great expense to students and families. Additionally, the Board responded to the problems created by this decision in part by lowering academic standards and allowing student absenteeism to become a growing problem. They’ve put in place a policy that eliminates deadlines and guarantees a 50% on all assignments and tests even if they are never turned in or attempted. I disagree with this approach and believe that the best way to recover is to focus on lifting struggling kids up, not to lower system-wide standards.

What are the critical differences between you and the other candidates seeking this post

Running a Manassas preschool puts me in touch with the needs and worries of young families, many of whom are turning away from the Manassas City public schools and even leaving our city. I want to attract these families back into our system. There is not currently a member with young children on the Board, and I believe the School Board could benefit from this point of view.

Additionally, if elected, I will be the only School Board member with Spanish language skills. I have members of my family who immigrated from Mexico, and I have also previously done international aid work in rural Nicaragua. I believe having someone with these experiences and language skills will be an asset to the MCPS School Board.

If you are a challenger, in what way has the current board or officeholder failed the community (or district or constituency)?

As a challenger candidate, I have my critiques. Although it has been a difficult few years for schools across the country, our school division exited the pandemic with some of the worst performance metrics in the region, which has ultimately culminated in us losing our full state accreditation at Osbourn HS and Metz MS this year. These were preventable outcomes. Less than 50 percent of students are currently proficient in math, while the chronic absentee rate jumped to 30% at Osbourn.

Describe the other issues that define your campaign platform.

I want our schools to be more effective and more attractive to families from all corners of our community. Part of this is addressing general topics of academic rigor, truancy, and behavioral problems. Part of this is exploring the creation of offerings in both early education and high school that a broad range of students and families find attractive. And part of this is outreach. Our schools need to better advertise what they have to offer and create a sense of excitement around MCPS. MCPS currently does outreach events in some neighborhoods but not others. Prince William County schools offer pre-K events for prospective families, but we do not. We should do more conscious outreach to help families buy into our school system early in children's education journeys.

What accomplishments in your past would you cite as evidence you can handle this job?

I’ve previously worked directly with at-risk kids in a troubled public high school in a different system. In this capacity I witnessed kids graduating without mastery of basic academic concepts such as putting numbers on a number line. This was a formative experience for me, and I have developed an educational philosophy around the importance of academic rigor and workforce preparedness that will guide my work as a Board member. I also have experience as a paralegal working in family law and in the school system litigation. Currently I run a Manassas preschool putting me in touch with the thoughts of young families.

The best advice ever shared with me was:

Do what is right, not what is easy.

What else would you like voters to know about yourself and your positions?

I grew up in a working-class town with a large immigrant community. My father worked at a truck depot and my mother struggled while attending community college at night and raising three kids. Many of my childhood friends or their parents were English language learners. I have experienced how language and cultural barriers create schooling challenges, but the public schools I attended were well regarded, and I know we can be doing better here in Manassas.

See also:

• Candidate Profile: Mel Kent For Manassas City School Board
• Candidate Profile: Jill Spall For Manassas City School Board
• Candidate Profile: Samuel Gross For Manassas City School Board
• Candidate Profile: Lisa Stevens For Manassas City School Board